St Thomas GIM
Academic Aspects Preceptors Dr. Burns - Doing ICU only now so I'm not sure if anyone will get him for GIM anymore. Dr. Sardar: General internist with an interest in cardiology. You will work one-on-one with Dr. Sardar, or there may be a med student placed there (they tend to be international med students on elective). Dr. Sardar is a willing teacher and enjoys discussing the evidence behind it, but you need to push a little bit. I found him a little aloof but generally a nice guy. Dr. Soliman - Worked a week with him while Dr. Sardar was on vacation as he shares an office with Dr. Sardar. Very, very, very nice and more enthusiastic about teaching. Will pimp a bit in terms of differentials but is great at talking you through it. Very passionate guy, everybody in the hospital seems to love him. Dr. Chehade - Shares clinic space with the others, but I think is doing mostly ICU only now. Teaching to Service ratio No formal teaching sessions, but informal teaching as time allows. Definitely less teaching than on a CTU rotation for example. May require you to ask specific questions. Occasionally Dr. Sardar will assign you something to look up and bring back the next day. I would personally have liked more teaching. Other Learners Sometimes an international med student. You may see other residents on anaesthesia, gen surg, ER, etc. Location Practice Population small town and rural population mainly. Mostly from Port Stanley, St. Thomas and Aylmer but some people make the drive from London as wait lists are shorter. Community Accommodations No accommodations available. Daily 40-45 minute commute from London. Week in the Life of... What does a typical work week look like on this rotation? STEGH used to have an "internist of the week" style rotation, but things have gotten pretty confusing lately as the ICU is a closed unit now. Currently, if someone goes to the ICU, their MRP is the ICU doc. If they come out to a floor, the ICU doc stays their MRP unless they transfer to someone else. Most standard medical/surgical patients admitted through emerg go to the hospitalist ("CA" Service). The internists (Soliman and Sardar basically) occasionally are MRP on a patient (We never had more than 2 at once when I was there) but are usually consulting service for urgent pre-op surgical patients or when the CA service wants a second opinion. These can still be some neat cases, but the inpatient workload isn't huge these days. It's really an outpatient rotation, with two weeks where you fit in a couple of ward consults/follow-ups during the clinic day. Dr. Sardar has a clinic from 9-12 each day at the hospital (a lot are pre-op ortho patients) and then sees patients at the office on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons (~1245 until ~5pm). These are a mix of new consults and follow-ups. A lot of patients are just optimization of cardiac risk factors or weird symptoms that family docs have investigated pretty thoroughly already. Call requirements Optional call. Usually Dr. Sardar tried to sign off or discharge patients prior to the weekend. Other Things to Add I was a bit disappointed in my rotation here. I was looking forward to the opportunity to look after some ICU patients but I found that any procedures (intubations, lines) were done by the anaesthetists, not the internists. A pretty low-key rotation overall; reasonable expectations. Dr. Sardar/Soliman's schedules are confusing and change frequently. Lots of afternoons off.